New graphics card new problems, Nvidia GT 710 2GB

[realflow100]

I got a new GPU from amazon for about 30$
So I got a ZOTAC NVIDIA GeForce GT 710 2GB PCIe x16 2.0
Put it in my computer and i immediately had problems
First problem
Computer wouldn't turn on.
Kept cycling on and off repeatedly... so I turned my computer off by unplugging it.
And this time I unplugged the hard drive to see if my computer would boot without it.

worked but i noticed the bios got completely reset. so i had to manually plug the hard drive back in while the computer was on and change the bios settings to enable hard drive controller1 and some other settings like virtualization and speedstep (now it boots up fine without cycling on and off or needing the hard drive unplugged? I guess the capacitors needed to be charged for the first time and they were never primed or tested?)

A restart and windows won't boot past windows startup logo (Forgot to disable integrated graphics driver)
so i boot into safe mode and uninstall it. let it install VGA drivers
Now ive got the driver installed from the nvidia website (without the 3D vision or HDMI audio drivers and other things i wont be using)

i installed PhysX though
but now I get random display driver crashes IF DWM/AERO is turned on (i made a seperate partition and never had any crashes on a windows XP 64-install

It crashes and successfully recovers.. Sometimes its when opening a game. right clicking my desktop to bring up context menu. or opening a new tab. pausing a youtube video. Playing a really long youtube video.

but it doesnt crash with DWM/AERO turned off. at all ever. instead I get lots of crackly audio on youtube (IF) my taskbar is showing and not "hidden"
but I open my start menu with the taskbar showing and it stops the crackling audio. And hovering over a link to make a extended text bubble appear makes the audio start crackling as well (this doesnt happen if DWM/AERO is on)

so I have two choices. random driver crashes and recovers.. or crackly audio doing certain things.

Ive tried the drivers from the CD/DVD and NVIDIA's drivers and theres no difference.

it also doesnt make a different if i underclock my CPU and GPU to the lowest they can go. or overclock them to the highest they can go.

(I also even tried raising my PSU voltage with the potentiometer adjustment dial with a micro precision screwdriver) so from 11.91v to 12.09v and my -12v and 5v and +12v are locked to the same dial. so I got 5.17V for 5v (within spec below 5.25v) And it helped my CPU overclock a tiny bit more (50mhz more) but nothing else changed besides that to be honest. its a very old computer (One of the voltage adjustment knobs don't seem to do anything at all.. seems broken. none of the voltages change when i adjust it. so only the main pot does anything)

For some reason even with DWM/aero off or on. I dont get any crashes during playing a game of any kind. (only when I go to start a game like clicking the .exe occasionally i'll get a crash but it usually doesnt make the game crash and i can just ignore it)

The audio crackling thing happens no matter how I play audio from my computer.. USB. bluetooth wireless adapter.. USB headset. 3.5mm jack front or rear. happens anyways. but only when DWM/AERO is disabled.. Happens if I watch 144p to 1080p60FPS videos or even playing audio in WMP or VLC
Sometimes even when playing games.. although gameplay isnt affected.

Surprisingly the GPU can overclock by huge amounts and still need no voltage adjustment and be stable no visual artifacts or glitches.
up to 1200mhz core and 1200mhz memory without any voltage change. almost a shear 50% increase in both memory and core.. And FPS.

Stock is 954mhz core and 800mhz memory.
And the temp barely rises by even 5*C when overclocked this much. so I flashed the bios to be permanently overclocked to 1200 and 1200 and its been fine no change in stability.
temp is only 55*C under 100% load for several hours (no fan but it still stays cool good)

 

[ThrashZone]

Hi,
Are you still using a 220w power supply ?
This card requires a minimum of 300w
GeForce GT 710 | Specifications | GeForce

I saw another one on Newegg that says the same thing,
ZOTAC Synergy Edition GeForce GT 610 DirectX 11 ZT-60601-10L 2GB 64-Bit DDR3 PCI Express 2.0 x16 HDCP Ready Low Profile Ready Video Card-Newegg.com

 

[RoasterMen]

You'll be fine with 250W. 300W for GT 710/610, and GT 620/720 is overkill. 220W is holding it back because your computer doesn't have enough to supply power to your Graphics Card.

 

[realflow100]

Well the thing is I upgraded my CPU and RAM to the max
4GB and core 2 duo 3.16Ghz and there isn't even a tiny bit chance in stability.
It seems more like a driver issue rather than a hardware issue.
My computer only uses about 10-12 amps maximum under full GPU and CPU load with my hard drive cranking (tested by using a 400 watt power inverter in which a 200 watt vacuum cleaner takes 20-22 amps at 12v inverting up to 120v AC 2 amps
The computer barely takes half of that amount of power/amps/wattage when at full max load.

And thats less than 200 watts in total.. I dont understand how it could be faulting.. My PC doesnt shut down or anything.. the PSU is cool to touch and not warm or hot.
My GPU says it only uses about 25W total on the datasheet for it (overclocked maybe a little more but even when overclocking i dont get any increase in crashes or anything

The crashes are only software/driver based and not hardware based.. No system restarts or BSODS with the new graphics card.
I'm honestly thinking my windows install is faulty at this point and thinking of upgrading to windows 10 just to see if it fixes this issue. if it doesnt i can always roll back up to 30 days after upgrading.

 

[RoasterMen]

That's good news. However, we do NOT know if the power supply on pre-built computers are even good enough to supply juice. (The 80+ Rating should be ignored because it's all about the quality.)

 

[ThrashZone]

Hi,
The free upgrade to 10 has expired

 

[Mellon Head]

My computer only uses about 10-12 amps maximum under full GPU and CPU load with my hard drive cranking (tested by using a 400 watt power inverter in which a 200 watt vacuum cleaner takes 20-22 amps at 12v inverting up to 120v AC 2 amps
The computer barely takes half of that amount of power/amps/wattage when at full max load.

And thats less than 200 watts in total.. I dont understand how it could be faulting..

Not sure about your testing methodology and I don't really understand how you did it, but AC current does not equal DC current. When the voltage goes down, the current increases for the same load. A current measurement inside the PC will be very different from one based on what is used at the wall socket. You could easily be exceeding the power rating of the PSU on one of its rails. Presto! Crashing.

Add to that the fact that OEM power supplies are not that good to start with. From experience with this forum, it would seem that many of them have trouble meeting their rated power output, and that is when they are brand new. As a power supply ages, the amount of power it can provide diminishes. What was once a 220W supply can now become a 180W power supply if you factor aging capacitors into the equation. Any supply should only be operated at 90% of rated output power, maximum, anyway.

 

[Layback Bear]

@ realflow100

All the measurements you have made mean nothing.
Forget about all the charts and graphs.
You asked for help and it was given.
Upgrading your power supply is the first step.
I say first step for a reason. Don't assume their is only one problem that needs dealing with.

 

[realflow100]

I cant upgrade the power supply. its built specifically for this computer model. i'd have to find an identical one if i'd want it to fit. and that wouldn't solve the problem anyways. but i highly doubt its the power supply since this happened before I got more memory. and before i upgraded the processor.
AND it happens completely RANDOMLY.

I just upgraded to windows 10 and the display driver hasnt crashed and recovered successfuly ever since! And the audio crackling has been solved too. Guess windows 7 was buggy with this graphics card or something and i dont feel like reinstalling it
got a key from a friend that works so its all good now.

I know the computer uses less than 200 watts because i measured volts times amps 12v times about 9-12 amps is still less than 150W
And my multimeter can measure AC and DC so I measured how much current and voltage coming into my 12v power inverter from a 12v battery which was about 9-10 amps and 12v

I even ran the computer off another computers PSU rated 220W from a single 12v wire powering the 400W inverter and powering my computer with the inverter and both computers stayed on and didnt cut off even under maximum full load on BOTH computers.

if it was a power supply problem I would be getting a lot of rebooting and cutting off whenever I open a game to play it or my CPU usage reaches 100% while my GPU and HDD are doing something

Also just checked the label on the PSU and it says 235W so its pretty close.
235W is over 20 amps at 12v factoring in efficiency loss so that would be right about correct my computer uses less than 200W at any given moment.

 

[AddRAM]

So now you can clean install 10 and all your problems will be solved

 

[realflow100]

I actually did an upgrade and kept all my stuff and it still solved my problems

 

[RoasterMen]

Ha! Glad it's got all sorted out mate!

 

[realflow100]

I guess on to the windows 10 forums! if I revert back to windows 7 for any reason though ill be sure to come back here

 

[Seffrid]

Is it against the forum rules to run a sweepstake on when he'll be back ?

 

[realflow100]

aaaand im back... Was having issues with unrelated things (graphics card issue was not even close to the problems i was having on windows 10.. programs left and right having problems software-wise and files not being found

so im back to windows 7.. i was able to still revert back to windows 7 after the time it said.. because it never seemed to count down..
now im back with the latest graphics card drivers and the same issues...
I have less problems when I revert to integrated graphics but almost no openGL or directX support (and its VASTLY slower in minecraft although still playable on the settings i usually play at... 6 chunks view distance and all fancy settings in default minecraft-window size.. not a smooth 60FPS+ but not below 30FPS all the time either.

i have no idea what I can possibly do to fix this problem other than trying to send the graphics card back or getting a different one.
it says on the website it only takes 19W of power which is hardly anything at all so i strongly doubt its my PSU now.

as well as the problems happening in completely bland scenarios.. for example.. opening a new tab in chrome.. watching a non-HD youtube video not even in fullscreen..

yet I can play minecraft with 100% GPU usage for hours on end.
The problem is almost certain to happen when watching LONG youtube videos but it doesnt matter what quality the video im watching is in.. And the audio crackling issue is certain to happen if i have DWM/aero off and im watching a youtube video with the taskbar showing or non-hid.. except if i open the start menu with it shown it stops.. its like its just some weird quirk of this GPU or something.. Wish it could be solved but theres no updated bios or anything for this GPU.. and ive tried decreasing the clock and raising the voltage slightly.. and even doing the opposite and theres literally no effect no matter what i do to do anything.

I dont get any logs of what the "nvidia driver stopped responding and recovered successfully" says so I have no idea where the problem is even happening at. but its only when i do VERY specific actions. but its not all the time either. its a 50/50 chance of happening basically.. I could do something 5 times in a row and have no problem.. Or do it 5 times in a row and have a crash every time. its completely random when it decides to do it. (for the display driver crashing i mean)

sorry for crazy long post i am quite a typer but at least im detailed.

and for the audio crackling It doesnt matter what kind of audio im using from my computer either.. onboard sound drivers. headphone jack. speaker jack.. wireless Bluetooth adapter.. it absolutely doesnt matter it still happens.

 

[ThrashZone]

Hi,
Did you restore back using a system image created before upgrading to 10 ?

 

[realflow100]

nope i used the rollback feature in windows 10 which lets you revert back to windows 7 up to 10-30 days after upgrade but it was still showing as an option even after 30 days so I thought i might as well go for it since i was having worse issues not related to my graphics card on windows 10

 

[RoasterMen]

I could've sworn you could get a GTX 560 Ti for around the same or even less price.

 

[realflow100]

SHOW ME! If its on amazon i can get it next month or so.

Although it'd only be about 2-6x faster than my GT 710 2GB super-overclocked???

My GT 710 2GB is super overclocked to 1400mhz stable core. and 1200mhz stable memory.
Seems like its twice as fast as stock. Temperature doesn't even change by a single degree even with an insane overclock like this. stock is 954mhz core and 800mhz memory clock

Also the number of display driver "stopped responding and recovered" Hasn't changed at all from stock clocks compared to overclocked. So I guess i get a bit of a gain and no loss when overclocking it.

 

[ThrashZone]

Hi,
I missed the price but a gtx 750ti is showing in stock and 120.us from evga though they usually don't charge sells tax.
Might not make the price range for free shipping.
EVGA - Products - Graphics - GeForce 700 Series Family - GTX 750 Ti